Speeches of Freedom: A VR concept

If there is one area in the future of AR/VR development that I would really want to focus on if I was directing my own game it would be in the area of history. History became a new love to me during my time in middle school and continues to enrich my life as I continue to grow older. I feel that for a history experience on VR would be perfect if we could recreate the critical points of American history in VR. However, I didn’t want put in any dicey stuff in the game that is from American history that would make people uncomfortable. So, I thought a way that I could have critical points in American history without anything that would make people uncomfortable and that is having the VR user at the audience at some of the most powerful speeches in American history. Speeches of Freedom came from this idea and what I want it to remind Americans, new to the country or citizens born in America, what it is to be American and the values and trials that our country faced it is long history. The idea I had about being in the audience was birthed from this other game that I was interested in.

Blindfold : An inspiration to Speeches of Freedom

The game that inspired my idea to be in the audience in these famous speeches came from another VR game called Blindfold. Blindfold is a VR game that put you in the shoes of a Iranian journalist, who he is being forced to confess about his crimes by an oppressive regime. The main antagonist, Asadollah Lajevardi is asking the questions to the reporter that you control about the photographs that you provided to the foreign press and he threatens to kill you if you don’t confess your crimes. You control the reporter by nodding to say yes, shaking your head to say no or remain silent to not answer, but answer too quickly or slowly and the interrogator might question if you are telling the truth or not. The premise of the game is to simulate how Iran reporters are poorly treated for leaking photos of regime and provides and immersive and dark experience to player. Speeches of Freedom, however, wouldn’t be as interactive as Blindfold due to just being a bystander in the audience, but the speeches in American history will be faithfully recreated down from the speeches themselves, the area the speech was presented and the motions that the speaker was doing at the speech itself. We will also have talented voice actors that will mimic the intense and powerful speeches that historical figures were giving during the speech itself. All of what I said sounds pretty nice, but what kinds of speeches will be delivered in this VR game?

Speeches in Speeches of Freedom

Speeches of Freedom contains 8 powerful speeches from great figures in American history. We may add more in the future, via requests from other players, but for now there will only be 8 speeches in the game. The first speech in the game is Patrick Henry’s speech “Give Me Liberty Or Give Me Death”. Patrick Henry recited this speech in a Virginia convention that had met in St. Johns Church in Richmond, Virginia, March 23, 1775. They had to meet there instead of the Capitol of Virginia at the time, Williamsburg due to avoiding interference with the Royal British navy. Patrick Henry in his speech urged his listeners to break America away from the British rule and go to war with Britain, his famous quote is the title of the speech. The second speech in the game is George Washington’s first inaugural address. On April 30, 1789, George Washington took the oath to office as the very first president of the United States. After the oath was over, Washington and others retired to the Senate Chamber where Washington gave his inauguration. In his inauguration, Washington noted humbly that the nation’s power called him to be president and the responsibility of both the president and Congress to preserve “the sacred fire of liberty” and a republican form of government. The third speech in the game is Frederick Douglass’s “The Hypocrisy of American Slavery”. Frederick Douglass was the most influential African American leader during the 1800s. In 1852, the leading citizens of Rochester in New York asked Douglass to give a speech for their Fourth of July celebration and Douglass accepted. However, in Douglass’s speech, he gave a scathing attack on the hypocrisy of how a nation is celebrating independence and freedom when in it’s borders, nearly four million humans were kept as slaves. The fourth speech in the game is Abraham Lincoln’s “The Gettysburg Address”. In November 19, 1863, Abraham Lincoln has arrived at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania to deliver his famous speech in the town where the famous civil war battle happened. Lincoln spoke for less than two minutes because his speech was only 272 words long, but his historic address redefined the Civil War as not only a struggle to bring the United States back together, but for the principle for human equality. There were five copies of the Gettysburg Address, but for the game, we are only using the Bliss version because it is the one that Lincoln wrote himself. The fifth speech in the game is Franklin D. Roosevelt’s first inaugural address. Franklin D. Roosevelt gave his first inaugural address on March 4, 1933, he became president when the nation was still in the Great Depression and Roosevelt was unsatisfied with the previous administration’s reluctance to take care of it. In his address, his most ionic statement in his speech was “the only thing we have to fear is fear itself”. Roosevelt laid down his approach to saving the economy and shrinking the rising unemployment in America, while he is realistic about the future; he is still hopeful that the Great Depression will end. The sixth speech in the game is John F. Kennedy’s first inaugural address. On January 20, 1961, John F. Kennedy was succeeding Dwight D. Eisenhower as president of the United States of America. Kennedy in his inaugural address reached out to the Soviet Union for negotiations, but pledged that the United States will oppose any wrong doing that the Soviet Union will do. Kennedy also summoned the idealism of the American people with this statement “ask not what your country can do for you – ask what you can do for your country”. The seventh speech in the game is Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I have a dream” speech. Martin Luther King Jr. speaks to about 250,000 people, on August 28, 1963 at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., that demand equal voting rights and an end to racial segregation. King used the rhetorical talents that he had developed while has a Baptist preacher to show to the crowd of people that the negro is still not free. He equated the civil rights movement in his speech as the highest and noblest ideals of the American traditions, allowing many to see for the first time the importance and urgency of racial harmony. The last speech in the game is Ronald Reagan’s Berlin Wall speech. Ronald Reagan began his speech in June 12, 1987 at the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin, Germany. The gate sits next to the Berlin Wall that has divided the German capital since 1961 because the Germans that lived in East Berlin tried to escape to West Berlin. Reagan’s speech emphases freedom and the reunification of Germany as Reagan in his speech says to General Secretary of the Soviet Union, Mikhail Gorbachev to tear down the wall. So now that I have told you all of the speeches that going to be in the game; why would I want to make this game and to what purpose?

Why Speeches of Freedom?

Do to the recent trends of American politics, it seems that history is going to repeat itself due to the lack of knowledge that newcomers to the country have for American history. I wanted to make this game to remind people what it means to be American and even to show newcomers to the country all the sacrifices that we made to make them equal in our eyes. However, to me, I felt that it would be better for everyone in America to be able to experience these speeches “in person” and be an awe by the people that had ideals of a country that can be free and independent. That is why I chose VR as a platform, to give people an experience that will stick with them for the rest of their life. My hope for this game is that people who play it will make good decisions for America and be proud to be an American citizen. I was also thinking of showcasing the game to museums of American history to show how immersive listening to the speeches can be when you are in the era the speaker is. If anyone is reading this article that I made, please consider making Speeches of Freedom a real VR game.